Catalyst_ A Tale of the Barque Cats - Anne McCaffrey [1]
“Is that the truth? Well, I’ll be. Could I pet her? Would she mind? She’s such a pretty cat.”
“I suppose it would be all right,” Janina said, with a glance down at her.
The girl was already a bit more skittish than usual, and Chessie knew it was because she had opposed this latest pregnancy. Chessie couldn’t agree more, but she graciously lifted her head to meet the man’s fingers and felt Janina relax somewhat. The man had a gentle touch, and his fingers smelled pleasantly male and of a recent hearty meal. She gave the back of his hand a lick as he pulled it away.
“What a darlin’ girl,” the man said, smiling at her. He had a very nice white smile that made his rugged face look younger. Chessie approved. He could probably snap a rat’s neck with a single bite with teeth like those!
Janina beamed. Chessie’s young Cat Person took as much pride in Chessie and her babies as Chessie herself did. They had been together ten years, all of Chessie’s life and over half of Janina’s, who had been a mere human kitten when Chessie was born and the girl became hers. Some ships’ cats considered their Cat Person to be a cross between a caretaker and a colleague. Chessie had thought of Janina as an older sister initially. But over the years, through her many litters, she had come to regard the girl almost as one of her own kittens. A grown kitten able to help with birthing the others, but still so young and in need of reassuring nuzzles and purrs.
“I’m sorry, but I really need to keep moving,” Janina told the man. “We’re on our way to Dr. Vlast’s clinic now for her prenatal checkup.”
“A prenatal checkup for a cat? She must be really special,” the man said, keeping pace alongside them.
Chessie wanted a bath but couldn’t start one while clasped in Janina’s arms. The kittens were trying to pounce each other while still inside her, judging by the way it felt, and bouncing about the space station wasn’t helping. She shifted her weight so her pretty fluffy tail draped over Janina’s arm, making more room for her pretty fluffy rear. She mewed up at Kibble, as the rest of the crew called Janina. Apparently, a lot of Cat Persons on other ships had the same name, but Chessie was sure none of the others were as sweet and kind or took such good care of their Barque Cats as her Kibble did.
The man seemed to have appointed himself as their escort, walking easily beside them when the way was clear, breaking up clusters of thoughtlessly chattering people when it wasn’t with a cheery, “Gangway! Pregnant lady coming through!”
Janina said, “Thank you. Poor Chessie and her kittens have such a great reputation, and fetch such a big price that she hasn’t been given enough time to rest between litters, in my opinion. I want Dr. Vlast to check her over and make sure she’s okay. I thought her previous litter should have been her last for a while but I was outvoted.”
Chessie wished Janina had won. Motherhood had always been easy for her before, but this litter was disturbing. She dreamed of these kittens all the time—she couldn’t remember doing that before. Or having the cravings she’d had with this pregnancy, like those deliciously crunchy shiny beetles she’d discovered in the last shipment of fresh fruit from Jambago Trine. She couldn’t seem to get enough of them. Just thinking about them made her hungry.
“Those kittens must be worth quite a bit for the crew to risk stressing out Mrs. Puss here like that.”
Janina told him what the babies from Chessie’s last litter had fetched—a price that made the man whistle in appreciation.
“As much as that, eh? I knew that some of the Federated ships had cats, but I never knew they were so important, or that some were so much more special than others.”
“Oh my, yes. Chessie and her kind have been specially bred for service on shipboard and have saved countless lives! Having the right cat is like having the right engineer, or the right navigator.”